The Power of Portal Pages

To generate leads for your Web Site, you need to set up what are termed "Portal Pages".

Portal pages are entry points to your Web Site that generate specific traffic for a specific offer.

The most famous portal page on the Internet is Yahoo. This directory is considered an entry point to the entire Internet. It gets the most traffic because it has become the first stop for many Internet surfers.

Portal pages for your Web Site are arranged on individual items, products, services, or reasons, for people to visit. Let me explain.

A Web Site may offer thousands of books for sale, but the customer is coming for a specific reason. You need to set up entry points to address their specific needs.

For example, at my Web Site I offer two training programs; the Director of Sales, for those offering Web sites, advertising, and related services. I also offer the E- Business Maximum Cash Flow System, which targets anyone with a product or service to sell online.

Obviously, one market is selling to the other, so I need to set up separate entry points. These products are better presented separately, so I set up two addresses:

The E-Business Maximum Cash Flow System
http://webletter.net/impact/

The Director of Sales
http://webletter.net/sales/

By focusing each customer on only the product that brought them there in the first place, I can test the effectiveness to my target market.

Portal pages are ways to target your site for the visitors you are inviting.

The Goal: Give them Each a Special Place to Enter

By setting up portal pages, I basically put the entry points for each promotion on a separate Web Page. Instead of introducing them through my home page, I introduce them through a one product approach specific to their interests.

Many treat the Web as a catalog, when it can be an interview. This is where portal pages come in. Boost your Web Site's sales potential into overdrive by:

1. Creating a separate portal page for each product/service you sell. You can still create your catalog, but start with the individual products you will market. they should not be a mere listing of price and picture; act like you have an active customer interested in buying, and sell them this...as if this was the only page they would visit.

2. Begin with the end in mind. Your end goal is to have an organized Web Site that easily directs your customer to the desired sale. Build your portal pages, then organize them into as few categories/listings as you can.

3. If possible, never list more than 6 categories on a home page, or 6 items on a page. Too many choices confuses people.

4. Market each of your portal pages before you market your entire site. Drive them to the home page, but focus them on specific buying decisions.

5. Think of portal pages as points of purchase. These are the end goal to many people, but if you market and direct people via banner ads, email, and link exchanges to specific portals, you are bringing them directly to the buying decision.

6. Your customer is qualifying you, just like you are qualifying them. Give them what they want, and they will love you. Don't expect your customer to work hard to work with you.

7. Each back end product or service becomes its own portal page.

8. Focus them on one sale, and one sale only. Make it so crystal clear and stop overwhelming people.

9. When it comes to your business, portal pages should also be thought of as an interview.

Think about it; your visitor does not know you, and likely has 2-3 questions that need answering. Most Web Site flout graphics, categories, and other hard to use, catalog driven items. Ask them questions and answer their needs...immediately.

The sites that make it easy to work with them, will prosper. The overgrown catalogs full of any product or service will not.

The Web is about target marketing, about focusing your customer on just a few choices. Portal pages are the way to do this.